


in the crumbling walls

by crickets



Category: Community
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-07
Updated: 2011-01-07
Packaged: 2017-10-20 04:13:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/208617
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crickets/pseuds/crickets





	in the crumbling walls

Annie had always known that things at Greendale were not what most people would call normal. But she had always just chalked it up to that childhood kind of magic that settles over a place when you're _really, really_ happy. Everything seems more possible in those moments, more whimsical, and the strange just seems somehow charming.

So, when Shirley finds an old key tucked into one of her pockets, as if it just materialized from nowhere, and Abed suggests that it might hold some mystical properties that none of them can guess, _Annie laughs._

She doesn't laugh because it seems ridiculous. She laughs because it seems _possible_. And really, in the end, that, more than anything, was her mistake.

Sometimes things are better left undiscovered.

Not all keys are meant to fit into locks, you see.

She didn't understand that then.  
-

When things get bad, the group splits up. There are things they need to take care of. People they need to make sure are still alive. Days go by, but they still don't hear word from the others.

They wake up one morning and Chang has deserted his post. It's just the two of them now. "We have to go," Jeff tells her that afternoon his voice steady and dark. "We can't wait around anymore. We're getting transport and we are getting the hell out of this shithole."

"But they're our _friends_ , Jeff," she says. "We can't just.."

"Yes we can!" Jeff shouts, a sudden loss of control. "Do you really want to stay here and die, Annie?"

"No!" she answers, equally distraught.

"Because that's what it's going to come down to!" He continues to shout. "This isn't a birthday party that you're not inviting them to. This is our _lives._ "

"But..." Annie starts to protest, but the look on Jeff's face stops her.

She nods solemnly.

"Okay," she agrees. "Okay," she says again. "Tomorrow."

-

Annie gets a call on her phone from an unlisted number the next morning, and even though the reception is horrible she swears she can hear Shirley saying that they're okay.

"It had to be Shirley," she says as they crouch behind a dumpster in an alleyway. Jeff hands her a cup of coffee, concentrating on the grouping of cars beyond the alley, deciding which one looks like it still runs, like it still might have some gas so they can save the stuff in the can beside him as reserve.

"Where did you get this?" she asks, momentarily distracted by the hot beverage in her hands.

"Vending machine," he nods his head in no particular direction.

"Oh," Annie says, and it doesn't even matter that she doesn't particularly like coffee. This is nice. She takes a sip before she remembers what it was she was talking about. "Shirley," she says again. "She was trying to tell me something, somewhere to go. I think... Jeff, I think I heard her say north."

"Annie," Jeff gives her a look. "Listen, I am not going on some suicide Thelma and Louise road trip with you just because you heard somebody who may or may not be Shirley say a word that may or may not have been north."

"Jeff, please," Annie says. "Where else are we going to go? North is as good as any direction isn't it?"

Jeff makes a point in telling her how he doesn't really agree with her before telling her that he agrees. Annie smiles. That's the Jeff she knows.

"I guess it's just you and me, kid," he tells her.

-

On the road, they find photographs of weary travelers posted in every town, at public restrooms, in empty grocery stores, on phone booths, abandoned gas stations and diner walls: always with a date, sometimes a destination.

"It's a message," she tells Jeff, holding out one of the Polaroids that has fallen to the ground. "To tell people they've been here. To tell them where they're going."

Jeff takes the photograph between his fingers and examines it for a moment before pinning it back to the wall from which it fell. "Syracuse," he says. "That's a long way."

"Do you think..." Annie can't even finish the thought before the tears come.

Jeff reaches for her, pulls her into a hug, envelops her in his frame.

It's here, for just a few seconds, that Annie feels safe for the first time since turning the key.

-

The next afternoon, along the freeway, they pass what she can only assume is the wreckage from a head-on collision. Annie has to look away when she spots what looks like the body of a young boy, splayed out on the concrete in a crude fashion, red baseball cap shining in the sun.

Jeff stops the car. "Stay here," he orders when he gets out of the car, making his way toward the debris.

"Jeff, what are you doing?" she calls, but he doesn't answer. Annie watches as Jeff kneels down over the body of the boy and seems to take something from his hands, but she can't see what it is. He takes the next few minutes to rifle through the boys pack and to examine the contents of both vehicles. This is new. They've taken what they've needed so far, stolen gas and electricity and food where they've found it, but never have they scavenged from the dead before. The thought of it makes her feel sick, and she turns her gaze to the field at her left, watches a group of turkey vultures picking at the carcass of a steer.

Oddly, she thinks of mirrors.

Minutes pass, and she can feel Jeff getting back into the car, and then his hand on her wrist as he pulls her arm towards him and places something in it.

She looks down at the bulky instant camera in her hands. In Jeff's other hand, he holds several packages of film.

"These should last us a while," he says with a shrug.

Suddenly, she remembers something. The picture of a family standing together, broad-smiled, tired faces at the last stop. At the front of the group had stood a boy wearing a red baseball cap. Jeff must have remembered it too.

Annie can only nod as he puts the car back into drive.

\--

Jeff often dreams of the thing that they unleashed. And the sound of his voice coming so scared from his lips as he sleeps scares Annie more than anything else.

If he were snoring, she'd just reach over to his side of the old Buick and rap him on the cheek or push one of his feet over the side of the seat and onto the floor, whichever part of his body was closer. "I'm trying to sleep," she would whine at him.

But when he cries out like this, Annie can do nothing but just lie awake and listen to the terror in his voice.

Tonight though, his voice sounds different. "Annie," he calls out her name, a quiet but urgent whisper, no less terrified.

"Jeff," Annie pipes up, her voice groggy with half-sleep. "Jeff I'm right here."

When this doesn't help, she finds herself climbing over the seat-back and settling on top of him, shaking his shoulders. "Wake up," she whispers the words first, and then louder, but he doesn't stir. She moves her hands to either side of his cheeks and presses her lips to his roughly.

It only takes a moment, a few seconds at most, and Annie can feel Jeff responding. First, his hands go to her waist, and suddenly he's kissing her back, his mouth parting, a groan at the back of his throat. Annie finds herself mirroring his vocals, and then finally they part.

"What? That?" Jeff can't seem to form the question on his lips. And Annie's hand comes up to cover her own, still stinging with the feel of his kiss.

"You," she blushes. "You were having a bad dream." It seems the words bring a vague memory back to him and Jeff no longer looks startled. Instead, he just looks sad, like he's lost something he can't get back. He reaches out to brush the hair back from her face, but it just falls down again.

"Stay with me?" he asks her.

Annie grins sleepily. "Okay, but just until morning. After that, you're on your own," she jokes.

Jeff kisses her again, this time more chastely, casually. As if they do it every day. He moves to make a little more room for her but it's a mostly futile attempt, and finally Annie settles, her head resting against his chest.

"How bad was it?" she asks after some silence.

"The worst," he tells her. "The absolute worst."

-

Some towns were hit so fast and so hard that it's like they're frozen in time. There are no people, no looters, no sign of destruction or struggle. Just all these pretty houses lined up like nothing ever happened, stores, stock full, supplies ripe for the picking.

At the next one, Annie gets an idea and convinces Jeff to help her break into the sporting goods superstore at the center of the town. Jeff thinks she's nuts, and says they should go for the canned goods and the generators and the gas first. But Annie just tells him, later. She tells him, _tomorrow_.

That night, they feast on fresh fish cooked over a barbecue along with their last remaining can of beans and a box of wild rice. Neither of them says, _this is way better than Spam_ even though both of them are thinking it.

Jeff tells her that it's the best night he's had in a long, _long_ time, and Annie refrains from telling him _I told you so._

Instead, she says they should get a room, sneak into one of the abandoned houses or break into a hotel or _anything_ , says she's tired of sleeping in the car.

But before they even make it back to the car, Jeff kisses her under the moonlight, rough and urgent and Annie guesses that it doesn't much matter where they sleep tonight.

-

The next morning, Annie keeps her promise to Jeff and they hit every corner of the town looking for supplies. She wants to tell him they should just stay there. She wants to tell him that she finally feels safe, but she knows in the end it would be foolish. She knows their friends are still out there, _somewhere._

 _"Annie,_ " Jeff's voice calling to her is sharp and urgent. "Annie, take a look at this."

She heaves her pack, now heavy, over her shoulder again and goes to where he stands just outside the door of a hardware store.

There, plastered on the wall, are pictures of her friends -- _their friends_ \-- and looking rather smug too. At the bottom of each one is the name of a single town, and the date, just two days prior.

Annie squeals and Jeff rolls his eyes.

She grabs his arm, dragging him in the direction of the car.

"They're alive," she yelps, bouncing just a little in his direction. "I knew it!"

Jeff smiles at her and they stop walking long enough for him to look at her.

 _They kiss_.

 _-fin_


End file.
